Nightcallers Deliver The Wave Of The Future

Nightcallers

Nightcallers

There’s a new band hitting the sound waves, going by the name Nightcallers. Emerging out of thin air, they are now dropping a flurry of songs on us without any warning. With songs pulling from every style and direction, their album Who Calls At Night is a real treat for the ears.

“Phil and I have really put a lot of this together late at night,” explains Ben of Nightcallers. “We call each other late at night on the phone. We are heavily inspired by things like AM Coast to Coast and radio shows after midnight. So Nightcallers was one of the few connotations that connected to all of that.

“Another inside joke for us is that we have been friends for a really long time, and when we were in our very younger years, we used to do…..in the days before caller ID or whatever…….we used to call into the news and do prank calls and stuff like that in the middle of the night. So that’s another aspect to it,” elaborates Phil of this enigmatic group.

Once you hear their music, it’s readily apparent a lot of thought, urgency, and passion went into it.

“It’s something we have been working on for the last year,” says Ben. “Phil and I have known each other for almost twenty years and have come together on a myriad of projects. We never really worked together solely on one project and are both definitely on the same page on a lot of things about pop music and music history, and the things we appreciate and love. It was a challenge, in a way, to ourselves, to create something and not wait around for people to say yes or no to it, to not dilly dally around it. Pack something in with our full force and a singular vision to it.”

Nightcallers "Who Calls At Night" album cover

Nightcallers “Who Calls At Night” album cover

“We wanted the ability to move at the speed of creativity,” ruminates Phil. “And that’s something we are both really proud of about this. We have been able to get everything out there in a pretty expeditious manner without a lot of hang-up’s and waiting around.”

Every album is written differently, through the use of innovative methods and also by the personalities involved.

“The whole record was written chronologically, and it’s also a story that goes on throughout it,” Ben states. “So, it’s almost like we were working together to create this story, and then each song we knew had to be the next chapter to the story. We worked really fast back and forth and pushing each other on it. We only finished the record about two or three months ago and started getting it ready for release.”

Nightcallers have their eye on the button of the future, seeking new blends of disparate elements.

“One of the things I asked myself when making this record was how can we do something that feels modern and almost has an EDM sensibility sonically, and has pop song structures; and melodic elements that hearken back to much more vintage, classic lounge and pop and rock and new wave sensibilities that we feel are underrepresented right now in the pop/EDM artists,” conveys Phil.

“Phil and I are pop aficionados in like all genres of pop,” Ben discloses. “There’s a lot in certain styles of music where the sounds are so cool but there aren’t a lot of pop songs in that style or genre. So, we almost wanted to take some of the sounds from different areas and create more classic songs using them. We also had no rules a little bit about what could or couldn’t be a part of it. We weren’t necessarily starting a punk band that had to stay within certain lines. We wanted to create a band in the future that could pull from music that has and even hasn’t happened yet.”

And they pulled out all the stops to make something truly postmodern in today’s music world.

“This album is a story and a concept,” Phil asserts. “What is the soundtrack to the not so near distant future? So, what is music going to sound like in the near future but what are going to the be classic hits of that near future? And those are the soundtracks to our story.” Phil explained.

It doesn’t end there with the surprises of this band. There are still the live shows to anticipate.

“We haven’t been playing any shows yet, but we have been planning on what we might be doing for that,” reveals Ben. “It would definitely entail a production, like a stage production…we might spend a few dollars on lasers, and we would bring out all of our smoke machines.”

“A lot of the instrumentation on the album is live innovation and live performance, but done in a way that sounds more programmed than they are,” says Phil. “It wouldn’t be hard to do, but it has to be a big concept, it has to be worth doing that production.”

With plenty of live experience between the two of them, their excitement to bring the album to the stage is there in spades.

“The great thing about playing live, and what we would really look forward to with this project is……Phil and I kept this really under wraps so now the best part is sharing it with people, and share the entire experience you are trying to create,” Ben maintains. “Bringing them into the fold and sharing this moment that everyone is a part of. The cool thing about live performance is that it’s different than records, different than movies, different than what you watch on YouTube; it’s still this combustible organic thing that happens, people come together and get on the same wavelength. It’s a special thing about music no matter what genre you are talking about.”

“What I really look forward to is because the record tells a chronological story, and it’s written chronologically….I think it would be fun to have things that would help tell that story and get people in on our concept of how we are envisioning it – what the story, the visuals, whether it’s having a film playing behind us or have rockets that lift off or a spaceship,” Phil explains.

With an album that hearkens back to many of our favorite things of the past, such as fifties pop songs and new wave postpunk delights, while also fusing that with new sensibilities, their music often feels like you already know it yet surprises you with things you aren’t as familiar with. No matter your taste in music, this is one release not to be missed!

“One thing we want to warn people about is…. Nightcallers are real so you better watch out!”

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